Painting exercises are a ‘limited’ enviroment. So, lets try to limit this self-assessment to aim of these exercises. Picture making is alot more complicated than painting swatches. All the other elements come into play: you can’t separate colours from composition, for example. However, looking closely at how you used the Split-Primaries should you assess if they are working well in terms of sucessful picture making.
Self-Assessment Questions
The following questions help you pinpoint how you used intense & muted colours.
Exercise 3: Paint your own intense painting using the intense split-primaries.
- You were asked to use only intense colours. Did you?
- Bet that was difficult! Why????
- OILS & ALKYDS : Did you use white? Did it make the mixes more intense or not?
- Where didn’t you use intense colours?
- Which colour is the least intense?
- Every painting will have a colour that is the most intense. Where you did place the most intense colour?
- Is the most intense colour difficult to see?
- Are there many intense colours?
- Is the eye attracted towards the most intense colour?
- Did you have to switch many colours? Was that difficult?
- Are the switched colours in tune with the other colours?
- Did you have any difficulties mixing a good dark or a good black?
Exercise 6 : Paint your own muted painting using the muted split-primaries.
- You were asked to use only muted colours. Did you?
- Bet that was difficult! Why????
- Did you cheat & use black?
- OILS & ALKYDS : Did you use white? Did it make the mixes more muted or not?
- Where didn’t you use muted colours?
- Which colour is the most muted?
- Which colour is the least muted?
- Every painting will have a colour that is the most muted. Where did you place the most muted colour?
- Is the most muted colour difficult to see?
- Are there many muted colours?
- Is the eye attracted towards the most muted colour?
- Did you have to switch many colours? Was that difficult?
- Are the switched colours in tune with the other colours?
- Did you have any difficulties mixing a good dark or a good black?
Sometimes we can’t see our own painting…
I believe the first step of assessement is clear, bare observation. Try to see what you are looking at before you judge it.
“Painting is the art of making burnt sienna look like vermillion.” – DEGAS
A common discovery found from doing these exercises is that it is difficult to make a painting with only ‘pure’ intense colours or one that only has muted colours. Part of the reason for this is that colours do things to each other, especially when when you juxtapose them (and even when you don’t they seek each other out or avoid one another…). Lay one colour down & then add another colour somewhere else… And they change each other! What looks muted before on the palette becomes intense when laid down besides another certain colour that once seemed muted. They change. A painter has to be alive to this.
However, we can say that a painting has either a predominantly muted palette or a predominantly intense palette – with certain intense accents or harmonizing muted sub-themes.
Mostly muted, with some intense accents
Example of a painting with a mostly muted palette but with some intense accent colours.
Look at the white in the clouds & the lady’s hat. Observe the intense red poppies – do they becomes paler & greyer as they recede? Again, look at that the violets. Where are the most intense violets? Where are the least intense violets? How does Monet use muted violets in this picture? See the delicate greys that weave throughout Monet’s oil painting. Observe the muted greens & browns. Do they jump out of the picture? Look at Monsieur’s jacket : does it belong to green family? Does it bledn, into the surrounding fields? More so than than Madame’s white dress? To my eye, the muted greens & browns play an imporrant role in separting the reds from violets. Theyt also give value to the whites, allowing them to sparkle. Isn’t madame’s white costume & the silver-lining in the sky such a dazzling answer back to the beautiful muted greys. It’s the muted colours that weave this painting together.
The infinite way in which
RUSKIN
everything alters everything else.
Colour to Value
Observe this chart. Above are the primaries with their secondaries. Below, they are converted into tonal values. Shades of grey. Practice this skill to see both colour & value, chromatic & achromatic. Whilst the camera does NOT see in the same way that our human eyes see, this machine can be fairly useful for an approximate indication. Take a photo of both your intense & muted paintings, then convert them into black & white photos. This should help you percieve the values in your paintings.
BELOW : the approximative equivalents as tonal values
Note that this particular blue is not as dark as this particular green
